


Zoomorphism

by inkfrond



Category: Hotline Miami (Video Games), ジョジョの奇妙な冒険 | JoJo no Kimyou na Bouken | JoJo's Bizarre Adventure
Genre: Alternate Universe - Hotline Miami, Gen, it's pretty cool that hotline miami and stardust crusaders take place almost at the same time, mentions of vanilla ice but he doesn't really do anything
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-27
Updated: 2017-03-27
Packaged: 2018-10-11 13:41:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,558
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10466310
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inkfrond/pseuds/inkfrond
Summary: April 13th, 1989.





	

[6:49 PM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IvL3DWq43iQ)

Though he would only keep it as long as DIO deigned to pay the rent, it was a nice car.

Hol Horse wasn't a car type of man, never had been, but he could appreciate a good machine, and the Cressida DIO had handed him the money for was nice enough for enjoying an evening smoke in. Damn comfy seats. He crossed his arms behind the headrest, propping his feet on the dashboard, and huffed a cloud of smoke out the open window. The radio teetered on the edge of staticky, but he didn't need it to do much other than provide background drone anyway, diligently warble out the lyrics to some emissary of the Top 40s. Heading off could wait a few minutes.

Spring had swept over Miami in full force and done a fantastic job at prolonging the daylight. The night beginning to creep into the sky was relegated only to a dull lilac, bleeding into orange and finally glowing pink at the horizon—it could've been a postcard, complete with the curving silhouettes of palm trees. Warm, thick air rolled in through the driver's side window, and he let his head tip back, eyes falling shut. Hol preferred this ambient, faraway Miami, but he doubted it would have cigarettes.

Leaning forward with a long breath from his nose, he opened his eyes and glanced at the rubber mask under the passenger seat. He wondered if his name was the reason, or if DIO had looked to something further in him in choosing the shape. Probably the latter, he decided, and keyed up the ignition. He had a long night ahead of him.

[8:05 PM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YobyKGXootM)

N'Doul was thankful, incredibly thankful, that humans made so much idle noise.

Nestled in the corner, the rubber cheek of his anserine mask brushing against brick grit and concrete dense under his thin shoes, he listened. Cars roared over pavement in the distance, neon buzzed in the sign above his head, and the leaves of the squat, decorative palms shuddered in the wind, certainly, but more important than them were the muffled, heavy footsteps, the voices, the gruff laughter. The door was a meager meter-and-a-half away; a fragment of the noise approached. N'Doul clutched his cane tighter, shifting his grip, as the doorknob turned.

He doubted the man even saw his assailant before the crook of N'Doul's cane collapsed his skull. A wet _crack_ resounded, but only as far as the back stoop of the building—none inside would know. He caught the body before it hit the ground and dragged it aside, laying it down with rapidly bloodying fingers. There was less grace in this than in his usual methods of killing, but with Geb scouting ahead, that could be excused. For multitasking, he had done fairly well. Briefly, he wiped his fingers on the hem of his vest. A firm grip was of importance for further multitasking.

The remainder of them, then. Geb moved readily to his command, coursing through the floorboards to the building's entrance hall and lingering, bubbling in anticipation. He felt through it, as though through the depths of his own chest, the vibrations of footfalls above. Once again, it was a single target. Heavyset, probably a good hundred and eighty centimeters, and armed, judging by the faint clicking. Geb shot up, piercing from their inner thigh to their heart as easily as N'Doul might thread a needle, before continuing to the next one.

[11:33 PM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vzLiHHvK0w)

They were blocks and blocks away before finally taking the masks off.

An inexplicable relief always filled Oingo to see his little brother under the long, curving beak and ridges of textured feathers of the mask. It was such a creepy mask—even with the eyeholes, unless he looked closely Boingo's features were swallowed up by a black-eyed, blood-spattered bird's. He wasn't sure who he expected to come out when it was removed, but he was always glad it was Boingo. He peeled his own mask free, the skin of his face stretching where sweat had stuck it to the rubber before falling back with an elastic _snap,_ and set it aside Boingo's on the backseat. His he at least knew the exact inspiration of. While he wasn't sure a goat was the most fitting of animals for contracted killing sprees, there was a comfort in that.

He ran a gloved hand over his face, pushing up his damp hair. “You good, lil bro?” Boingo nodded mutely in response, his mass of curly hair bobbing as he did, and the adrenaline just beginning to ebb from Oingo's veins broke in a laugh. “Here,” he said, and reached into the glove compartment to retrieve Boingo's visor before proffering it to him. “That oughta help.”

After replacing the hat, backwards as always, he reached into the inside of his coat and offered in return the pistol that had been secured there. Oingo knew without weighing it that it wasn't full. If he remembered right, they'd needed about half exactly, so that made four left for later. “Thanks.” It took the visor's place in the glove compartment. “We did good today, bro. Bet Lord DIO's gonna pay us extra.” Boingo nodded again and pulled Thoth onto his lap from beside the passenger seat, beginning to flip through it. Thoth's predictions for these things were always a little strange, a little too detailed, more like a map than a course of action. Most likely, that alone had been keeping bullets out of them.

Oingo wouldn't dwell on that too long.

“Let's grab a pizza.” Though it'd take some minutes for their appetites to return.

[12:24 AM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=go6po2Za_18)

She never wore her good outfits on the job—those were a parcel in the trunk to be changed into in the backseat.

It made for a nice, discreet exit, but Mariah wouldn't even try and pretend that she kept them for discretion's sake. Discretion be damned, she absolutely could not be expected to spend hours priming an area with Bastet and then another hour or so clearing the place out without immediate and worthwhile recompense. Lord DIO's payment was all well and good, but after mowing through throngs of furious, terrified humanity what a girl needed was alcohol. Alcohol, the soft glow of neon, and pulsing bass.

The cushioned stool and the sleek, cool plastic of the counter under her elbows was a welcome counterpoint to the throbbing behind her temples. The high of the adrenaline had faded, leaving her with only trembling hands and a headache—the thought flitted across her mind that alcohol might not help. She crushed it away with the other things for Future Mariah to deal with and took a long swig from her glass, nearly downing it in one go. The cut where one of her kills had nicked her with a machete was starting to sting under its bandage.

Another sip finished it off. Well, shit, that wasn't enough. With a raise of her finger and a calculatedly flirtatious smile, she hailed the bartender and ordered another. His eyes drifting down to the exposed vee of her cleavage was a comforting constant, and adjusting her bandages through her shirt, she settled further into her seat to wait for her drink.

[2:00 AM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UFBmem35WJ0)

After a century, he'd finally reached America.

Funnily enough, he had barely remembered where he'd intended to go boarding that ship when he had first crawled ashore. In those moments, all that had mattered was leaving the ocean behind, finding someplace—any place—to wash the smell of brine off of him and dry in the open air, and when he'd found a place in Egypt, he had hardly entertained the idea of leaving.

Fate had funny ways of pulling his strings. As he established himself, extended his reach, amassed followers, he came across what he had initially dismissed as a nasty coincidence. By Speedwagon Foundation, they couldn't have meant that Speedwagon, the one who had done nothing but follow Jonathan like a particularly loud, servile dog. He must have had rich, stupidly philanthropic relatives, funding another organization to toss money at the general evils of the world.

Unfortunately, he did not, nor did his Foundation busy themselves with nonsense. They knew of the Ripple—but more worryingly, of Stand power. With the resources at their disposal, if and when they decided to assist the Joestars, even DIO would frankly be at a disadvantage.

However.

Knowledge of Stand power was far different than possession.

DIO's lounge was a thing of crisp, monochromatic matte mixed with garish neon greens and yellows, lit only by the blush of the neon lights snaking along the walls. Glass tables shone with a faint, inorganic light, and even the bookshelves were black against the shining white of the walls and floor, plastic and metal rather than wood. America of this age had such ostentation; for as much grief as the Speedwagon Foundation had brought him, he thanked them for situating their headquarters in Miami, of all places, this city of heat and human decadence. Smiling into the dark, teeth glistening, he reached down to cup the chin of the man who knelt between his legs in nothing but a dog mask and a leotard.

It was as good a city as any to make his own.

**Author's Note:**

> if you look closely you can see me just sorta losing my will to live at the end
> 
> the masks are, in order: a horse, a goose, an ibis, a ram, a cat, and a dog, mostly based on the egyptian gods  
> and yeah vanilla ice is the dude in the dog mask. i kinda want to write a separate thing for that now actually
> 
> dio's default outfit in this au is the one with the feather boa/jacket combo and the snake belt by the way


End file.
